A Walk In the Park
by pdljmpr6
Summary: A hike through the woods becomes a run for their lives, forcing Eliot and Parker to come to terms with a few things. Eliot/Parker est. ship, whump and fluff abound.
1. Such A Beautiful Day

**A/N:** Good lord there's something wrong with me. No one should be posting this many fics, this often, about one character in any one fandom. lol. I seriously need help or my own copy of the S1 and 2 dvds...lol. Okay. so here's my newest venture. I'm going to try very hard to keep updates coming with my usual frequency since I have the story outlined, but it's not completely written yet so...yeah, we'll see. I may need lots of prompting (hitn hint, lol!) So, here it is, Enjoy. -pj

---

The forest was calm and quiet as the morning sun broke the horizon. Small birds sang melodious in the trees and ground animals scurried about in the soft earth, enjoying the few hours of coolness until the sun warmed up the air and burned off the dew.

Somewhere below, however, the peace was about to be disturbed.

"Ugh, Eliot," Parker called out, sounding suspiciously close to whining, "why do we have to start so _early_." She kicked at a fallen log to the right of the trail out of spite and glared at the birds chirping happily in the trees.

Eliot snorted, readjusting his backpack full of supplies slightly, never breaking his stride, "it's not early Parker. It's almost eight."

"Whoa, _what_?"

He heard her footsteps stop and turned to face her. She had a backpack similar to his own, holding food and water and whatever he saw fit to pack for her. Her hair was up in a haphazard ponytail and her face sans makeup, but somehow still glowing. She wore a hooded sweatshirt to keep off the morning chill, though the sentiment was negated by her cargo short shorts, ankle socks and hiking boots.

"You woke me up _before _eight am?" She asked incredulously, clearly contemplating doing him harm.

Eliot tilted his head with a teasing grin, "what? you've gotten up earlier."

"Yeah for a job!" she exclaimed, closing the distance between them with a huff, "not for a day-long hike through the woods with bugs and animals and dirt."

"Or for me," he said, disarming her anger with a single look and bringing his mouth to within a breath of hers.

Parker remained stubborn, "but _not _for a hike," she repeated, though with a bit less ferver than before. "Ever heard of beauty sleep?"

Eliot grinned, dropping a kiss onto her stubbornly pouted lips, "ya' don't need it."

Parker rolled her eyes, but couldn't hide a small, flattered smile.

Eliot turned to continue on the way but this time grasped her hand so he was walking beside her instead of out in front. This seemed to lift Parker's spirits a bit and she started jabbering on about her favorite lift, a rare Degas from the home of a private collector in Rome.

Eliot nodded and 'hum'ed when the conversation called for it, but didn't mind just letting her talk. He wasn't big on conversation and Parker could keep one up for the both of them, which suited him just fine.

They were opposites in many ways. He quiet, she loud. He calm, she frenetic. He liked to plan ahead, she lived to be spontaneous. He liked both feet planted firmly on the ground _thankyouverymuch_ and she was happiest flying through the air on a wire.

But in other ways, perhaps the most important ways, they were the same. Both had their own warped sense of honor, a code they did not break. Both were protective and loyal and gave their trust slowly.

They both craved human contact, though for reasons neither of them were willing to explore just yet. And had both spent their lives finding it through sex with nameless, faceless partners. And it had started out that way between them too, with Parker asking with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer after one of their training sessions if Eliot wanted to share the shower this time. Eliot had sputtered, stared, regained his footing and followed her wordlessly. They went on hot and heavy like that for a few weeks before things started to change and grow into something more which was, ironically, less. Their fingers brushed when they walked alongside, an almost hidden smile when Eliot teased Hardison, a look from across the room when he wanted to assure her he was alright.

Suddenly it wasn't about he sex anymore. It was about them.

They were eachother's counter balance.

Eliot smiled to himself. It had taken him a long time to get to a place where he was okay with being so intertwined with another person.

And no one was more surprised than he that that person ended up being Parker.

"And then my line snagged and I couldn't believe it because these dogs were just-"

"Parker stop."

Parker, who had been bouncing with the exuberance of telling her story and twisting her head this way and that to take in the scenery frowned up at him and his interruption.

"What?"

Eliot didn't answer, but released her hand, took her shoulders, and pointed her in the direction he was looking.

"Oh my-" she whispered.

The scene before them was taken straight from a painting.

A clear, glassy lake stretched out in front of them framed by low hanging trees that swayed lazily in the spring breeze. Birds sang a chorus over head, every now and then diving from the branches to chase one another, skimming across the water and shooting back up into the air in a dazzling gymnastics routine that Parker envied. On the opposite shore a doe and her baby cautiously broke the treeline to approaching to the water for a drink.

Parker felt Eliot rest his chin on her shoulder and moved her hands to his where he'd clasped them around her, squeezing them tightly in expression of her excitement, not wanting to disturb the serene scene by shouting.

She glanced over to find Eliot smiling and it made her smile too. It was his real smile. Not his teasing smile, or his 'you're an idiot' smile or even his 'this is actually gonna work!' smile. It was the one that said he was relaxed and content.

The smile he reserved especially for her.

She squeezed his hand again and looked around.

"Oh, El look," she managed to whisper but only barely and he turned to see her pointing up into the Birch tree beside them.

"A birds' nest," she murmured. Before he knew what was happening she had removed her backpack and dropped it into the dirt beside him with a thud, which startled the deer who took off into the woods.

"What are you doing, Parker?"

"I wanna see."

"Parker don't," he stepped toward her but she'd already pulled up far enough into the tree to be out of his reach, "that nest is like 30 feet in the air and if you touch 'em their mama won't come back."

"I'm not gonna touch 'em," she said, sounding as if it were even a ridiculous idea for him to express, "I like birds."

"Yeah, I know you do Darlin'," he muttered. She'd told him once, whispered it across darkness and wrinkled bed sheets, about how she used to wish she was a bird so she could just up and fly away whenever she wanted. The sound of wistful childhood yearning and the undertone of darkness in her words had set his stomach in knots that night, just like her monkey-like tree climbing was doing to him right now.

"If you slip and fall into the lake I'm not comin' in after ya'. It's cold."

Parker paused and looked down at him, nearly twenty feet below, and raised an eyebrow, "and if I fall toward the ground?"

He didn't hesitate, "I'll catch you."

He was smiling, almost teasing, but she had no doubt he would keep his word.

Not that it mattered. She didn't fall. Ever.

Parker had almost reached the nest and was shimmying out onto one of the outer lying branches when Eliot suddenly got a cold chill. He dropped his gaze immediately and frowned, flicking his eyes to the surrounding trees. He would have dismissed it as simple paranoia, which he'd been known to suffer from, from time to time, except he then saw a bunch of birds suddenly escape a treetop about ten meters behind them and his hackles rose, his senses going to full alert.

Shrugging off his pack and slipping a knife from his boot, Eliot looked up into the tree. Parker had made it to the nest and was talking quietly, he assumed to the unhatched eggs.

"Parker," he hissed. She looked down, hearing the seriousness in his tone, "stay put."

She frowned, about to ask him where he was going, but he'd already disappeared into the trees off to the right from where they'd entered the small clearing. She saw he'd pushed both his backpack and hers behind a bush so as not to be seen and found her heart rate speeding up at his strange behavior.

Only not strange behavior.

She had seen him like this many times before, usually right before a job went South. Way South.

---

_END__ - ::smiling:: Oh yeah. I went there. ::still smiling::  
_


	2. So Much for the Hike

**A/N:** I love you I love you I love you. All of you. Yes, you *points at screen*. _**georgie's-jail3, lilz54, luna-pendragon, SuzSeb, SeaStarr, eligin, spnchick, Angel JJK, MusicEstVita, NAVILLUS, redqueen74, simplygloomy, MissGuenever, kanefan892, Mayhem21, vickyloka**_ - you guys rock my little fangirl world!! I was super excited to see so many reviews from logins I recognized.

Okay, fair warning: I'm working on getting a beta (tired of going back to read my work and finding things misspelled, arranged wrong or missing) and that means my updates will be coming a little slower than usual, probably every 3-5 days. But know they are coming and I still love reading your reviews. Plus I'm impatient so I'll still probably put out one shots every now and then that are unbeated (if I can ever figure out how livejournal works. ugh) (that reminds me, look me up on livejournal (**pdljmpr_armada**) for the scoop on new fics in the works and the process that goes into it all!!) So, here it is for your Eliot/Parker pleasure...Enjoy. -pj

**Disclaimer**: Not mine. Also, I suck at writing fight scenes. Really. It would be better if you just imagine a fight scene on the show and skip those parts. lol.

---

Parker started working her way carefully down the tree, having decided 'stay put' was open to interpretation, and was only fifteen feet off the ground when movement caught her attention below.

That was definitely _not _Eliot. And if the black fatigues and big, expensive looking, extremely dangerous guns were anything to go by, they weren't out for a friendly hike either.

Force of habit made her freeze and she squeezed her eyes shut, momentarily subscribing to the 'if I can't see them, they can't see me' rule of thought. Then it occurred to her that that was ridiculous, even for her, and she opened one eye and glanced down.

There were three men, each sporting short quasi-military haircuts and they flanked out to cover the area in what Eliot would have undoubtedly called 'a very distinctive maneuver'. The one in the middle had dark hair, he pointed at the other two and said something in a garbled, guttural language that might have been Russian and they both started searching the bushes and behind rocks. One of the men, a blonde, had moved to check the edge of the lake and found her and Eliot's packs.

Parker bit her lip, wondering where Eliot had gone and when he would be back. Not that she didn't trust him but she was kind of a sitting duck if any of them thought to look up.

Turned out, none of them got the chance. The blonde shouted to the leader, pointing at the packs, then let out a sharp yelp of pain and fell to the ground. It was then that Parker saw the knife in his back.

She watched, rather enthralled from this vantage point as Eliot leapt from the tree-line and quickly disarmed both of the remaining men. She'd seen him fight, plenty of times, but never from above and she found it was almost an even better view than ground level.

An elbow to the first man's face coupled by a knee to his stomach sent him writhing on the floor, Eliot whipped around, not even waiting for the first to fall before he delivered a powerful punch to the leader's jaw, snapping his head back. Stunned, the man stumbled backward allowing Eliot to take advantage of his split attention and swipe his legs out from under him, sending him sailing to the ground.

The men were professionals though, and big, that much she could tell. The first had at least a foot on Eliot, but was thin and muscular. The leader was more typical 'thug' shaped, slightly overweight but still taller than Eliot by three inches. For every time Eliot would send them down they got right back up, bleeding and bruised but back for more, which Eliot seemed more than willing to deliver.

Parker's attention was drawn away from the fight but movement in the corner of her eye and noticed the first man getting up, somehow having reached around and removed Eliot's knife. It looked to have landed off the mark slightly and probably only stunned him. And pissed him off.

She looked frantically back at Eliot, but he still had his hands full, needing to split his attention between two first two behemoths who just _wouldn't stay down_. In fact, now that she looked, Eliot was the one on the ground. One of the men held him and the other kicked, Eliot was curled up trying to absorb the blows but it didn't seem to be helping much.

Parker's stomach clenched, something hot and uncomfortable started to churn inside her and she didn't like it. She wasn't sure if it was fear or anger, or maybe both, but it made it nearly impossible for her to stay still. She needed to _do _something.

The third man started to pull a gun from his waistband and Parker didn't hesitate.

Soundlessly, she dropped to the next lowest branch, then reached down and took hold with her hands, swinging down and delivering a swift kick to the blonde's head as she tucked and rolled into her landing and ended up on her feet.

She scrambled forward for the man's weapon as he groaned once and slipped into unconsciousness. She effortlessly released the magazine and the bullet in the chamber with a quick snap and flick of her wrist.

She raised an eyebrow at the unconscious man, "guns are cheating."

There was a dull thud behind her and she turned to look in time to see the dust settle around the body of the leader, now laying unconscious beside his comrade.

"Are you okay?" They asked in unison and both nodded in response. Parker stood up, brushing herself off as Eliot began searching the unconscious men for weapons and clues to their identities.

"Who are these guys?" She asked, wrinkling her nose. She didn't like being attacked, certainly not on one of her precious days off.

"AR-15, M16, 9mil," Eliot said, tossing each of the guns into the lake. He felt bad, marring such an untouched landscape with something as ugly and violent as a gun but knew if he left them on the ground someone else could find them and use them, and he certainly wasn't taking them with, "not exactly your typical deer huntin' guns."

"Yeah, gathered that."

"We better keep moving, I don't plan to be here when they wake up," Eliot said. He went to his pack and pulled out a bundle of rope.

"You carry rope with you? On a hike?" Parker tilted her head, giving him the 'there's something wrong with you' stare that had become something of an inside joke between them.

"You never know when you're gonna need it," he raised his eyebrows at their attackers.

"Good point." Parker nodded and then joined him in pulling the three unconscious bodies into a pile so Eliot could wrap rope around them.

They stood back to admire their handiwork.

Eliot tilted his head, "is that a bow?" He pointed at the knot Parker had made at one of the men's ankles.

"Yeah." She said blandly.

Eliot just shook his head and turned to retrieve their backpacks when something whizzed by his ear, exploding into the bark of a tree beside Parker's head. In an instant Eliot was on top of her, pushing her into the ground and covering her with his body.

"Is somebody _shooting_ at us?" Parker exclaimed as if the idea were completely ludicrous.

Eliot didn't respond, but grunted as he carefully maneuvered himself off of her and onto his hands and knees.

"Go," he ordered, motioning toward the trees, "stay low."

Parker nodded, following his direction and didn't get up from the crawl until Eliot said to a few minutes later. Then they ran.

---

Eliot berated himself internally for not seeing this coming. He should have sensed it before they left. He had a heightened sense of paranoia that rivaled most conspiracy theorists, but he hadn't realized they were being watched or followed.

Damn Parker and those short shorts and pouty lips.

And now, because he could only think with one of his heads at a time, they were running through the woods with nowhere to go. He'd studied the map before they set out, force of habit, but it had been to find good places to walk, not places to hide and defend.

At least, that's why he told himself he was angry, and it probably was a part of it, but it was by no means all of it.

"You think we lost 'em?" Parker asked quietly, slightly out of breath. She glanced behind but, now that they were off the trail, the trees and bushes had all started to look the.

Eliot ran for several miles a day anyway and Parker was light on her feet, so they'd run for almost twenty minutes before slowing down to a walk.

But she was still winded. She spent her crawling through air vents, not in track and field competitions.

Parker jumped when a bush rustled to their right and reached for Eliot's hand, threading their fingers tightly.

Eliot glanced at her, "just a rabbit, Parker."

She furrowed her brow at his annoyed tone. He didn't usually use that one when it was just the two of them, not unless…

She sighed, blowing her bangs off her forehead, "okay, what did I do?"

It was Eliot's turn to frown and he glanced quickly over their shoulders, his eyes keeping up their constant scan of the surrounding wilderness. "What?"

"Well you're all grumpy and growly so…what did I do?"

Eliot shook his head, "there are people with guns after me, Parker."

"_Us_. After us." She corrected.

"What makes you think they're after 'us'."

"Well what makes you think they're after _you_?" she retorted, indignant. She slipped her hand out of his and crossed her arms over her chest, "I'm wanted in just as many countries as you are, you know."

Eliot gave her that Look again and shook his head, almost smiling. Only Parker would be offended at the implication that angry men with guns weren't after her, but someone else instead.

"Fine. Us. Men with guns are after _us_. That makes me 'grumpy and growly'."

"No, that makes you tense and cautious. Which you are," she pointed out, having noticed the confident, edgy set of his shoulders and the way he was keeping part of his attention on her and the rest on the surrounding tree line, "but you only get grumpy and growly when I've done something wrong. Remember when I tried to make macaroni and cheese?"

"You put watermelon in it Parker. And you burned it to the bottom of my stockpot."

She nodded, "case and point." She reached back over to take his hand, "so tell me what I did and I'll decide if I want to apologize or not."

Eliot sighed, using the opportunity of pushing some low branches out of their way to stall.

"I told you to stay put," he said finally, not looking at her.

Parker contemplated this, "you're mad because I helped you fight those guys?" She scoffed, "I thought your ego was bigger than that, El."

He stopped abruptly, yanking his hand from hers and turning to face her. Parker didn't back down, or even flinch from his sudden movements. A fact he appreciated.

"It's not about my ego, Parker. Those men were dangerous. They had guns. They could've killed you. What would I have done if something had happened to you, huh?"

Parker swallowed hard. She didn't know people, but she knew Eliot, and she could see the concern and fear hidden behind the anger in his blue eyes.

It made her angry too.

"And _what_? I don't have the same worry?" she reached up and poked him in the chest, making Eliot blink in surprise, "you think it's any easier for me to watch_ you_ fight bad guys with guns? To hear you getting hit and punched over the coms when we do jobs? What am _I_ supposed to do when something happens to _you_?" Her look was stone and ice as she drew her finger back, "how you're feeling right now…welcome to my world."

She turned on her heel and stalked away. It took Eliot a moment to sift through all the angry rambling and he jogged to catch up.

"Parker I-"

"And I can take care of myself, FYI. I've been doing it a lot longer than I've know you."

"I know Parker I-"

"And it's not as if I got hurt. I knew what I was doing. I _helped _you. That guy was going to shoot you in the back, and then what? I can't carry you, I couldn't have hid you, I wouldn't have known-"

Eliot grabbed her arm, swinging her into his chest and swallowed the rest of her protest with his mouth.

"I wasn't done." She said breathlessly when he released her, leaning her forehead against his with her eyes closed.

"I'm sorry." Was his only response and she nodded, accepting his apology. He rested his hands on her hips and pulled back slightly to look at her.

"We should keep moving."

Eliot nodded and turned to point, "that way."

"Eliot," Parker gasped and reached out to yank his arm back toward her, "You're bleeding."

---

_END__ - Let the whump begin...also, I would like to point out that i posted this at 1:35am. Why? Because I couldn't stand the thought of waking up to no new reviews. Yes I know I need help...so help me! lol  
_


	3. Rain, Rain, Go Away

**A/N:** You guys are the definition of awesome. Seriously. Look it up, there are pictures of all of you (don't ask me how they got 'em, it's kinda creepy). I'm glad no one was completely thrown off by my (possibly not as bad as I thought) fight scene. Boosted my ego a bit. Must say there didn't end up being as much whump as I thought in this chap, but there is some. As always, I must thank my reviewers **_suddencarolina, Likeka, luna-pendragon, SeaStarr, redqueen74, A. Elisabeth, Megan, Mayhem21, vickyloka, Angel JJK, NAVILLUS, cresdin, eligin, SimplyGloomy, BookLover223, SuzSeb, MusicEstVita, Sweetpea2100_** I don't think i need to tell you all that you are my favorite drug. lol. And special thanks this time to my new beta: _**vickyloka **_Love ya girl! But if any mistakes remain, they are mind and mine alone. Now, for everyone, reviewers and lurkers alike...Enjoy! -pj

**Disclaimer**: Not mine. I'm in the market for Eliot though.

---

Eliot glanced down at what had attracted Parker's attention and saw a tear in his green canvas jacket, a deep crimson ring of blood soaking into the area around it. He grunted, not having felt the wound before and reached over with his right hand to pull the fabric out of the way for a better view.

"Just a graze," he drawled and moved to continue, antsy from standing still for so long. Parker's hand shot out in front of him and pushed him back a few feet to sit on a boulder.

"Yeah. Just a graze," she shook her head, probing and analyzing the wound a bit more thoroughly. Eliot hissed when she tried to poke at it and sent her a glare.

"I'll be fine Parker, we need to keep moving."

"We've been running for at least three miles," she countered, reaching down to her boot to pull out a knife, "we can afford to stop a minute to take care of this."

She didn't miss the way Eliot's eyes lit up upon seeing her small blade.

"You keep a knife in your shoe?" he asked almost disbelievingly, but…was that arousal she heard in his voice? She looked up to see his eyes had darkened slightly and shook her head.

"There's something wrong with you."

"Is it so wrong for me to be glad you've picked up some of my better habits?"

A smile kicked up the corner of her mouth, "what makes you think I picked this up from you?" she tossed the knife in the air and caught it, "we need to make a bandage." She pointed at him, "your arm, your shirt."

Eliot nodded pushing thoughts of where else on her person Parker might be hiding things out of his mind. Carefully he pulled off his jacket and took her knife, swiftly slicing a few pieces off the bottom of his t-shirt. Parker stepped forward to help him wrap them around his arm, her small, nimble fingers in stark contrast to his thick, calloused ones.

"I hate when you say that," she mumbled as he pulled his jacket back on, wincing as the movement pulled at his arm.

Eliot frowned, neither had spoken in several minutes, "say what?"

"Just," she said, still staring at his arm, "it's just a bullet wound, 'no big deal'. Just six guys the size of European cars, 'no problem'. Just a little bit of torture and starvation, 'I can handle it'," she grumbled, shaking her head, "you're not invincible you know."

Eliot stood, readjusting his jacket and stepped forward, placing his hands on her arms, "it really _is _no big deal, Parker. There's very little someone can do to me that I haven't done, or had done to me before."

Parker rolled her eyes, and looked away, crossing her arms tightly and Eliot realized it wasn't what she wanted to hear. But then, he wasn't really sure what was.

"Would you rather I cry?" he smirked.

Parker wrinkled her nose, "no. What are we? Girls?"

Eliot tilted his head with a slight frown.

"That's not what I…I mean," she huffed, "dammit."

She turned around and stalked away. Eliot laughed quietly and jogged to catch up.

---

Parker sighed, and glared at another pine tree as they walked passed while she tied her sweatshirt around her waist.

The hiking had been almost enjoyable when they were on the trail. But since running from the bullets and guns they'd not found a single patch of even ground or cleared forest floor to walk on.

"Where are we going, Eliot?" she asked, blowing her bangs off her head.

Eliot glanced at her and shrugged.

Parker stopped, "you don't know?"

"I'm not sure." He corrected, grabbing her hand to pull her along, wanting to keep moving. He didn't have a definite destination in mind, but he knew which direction they were going and could at least keep them from going in circles.

Parker wrinkled her nose, "sounds like the same thing."

Eliot made an annoyed noise close to a grunt and Parker closed her eyes, allowing her head to loll back and smacked her cheeks with her hands.

"Eliot," she said, outright whining now, "I'm hungry and I'm tired and it's starting to rain."

Eliot frowned and looked up, the cheery morning sun had been hidden by suddenly overcast skies.

"It ain't rainin'." He said, dropping his eyes to scan around them and then looked at Parker. She was frowning at him.

"I can't believe you brought me out here into _nature _when it was going to rain."

Eliot sighed, watching the small woman climb over a large tree trunk that had fallen over a boulder in a windstorm long forgotten. She waited on the other side with impatiently tapping toes while he walked around the mess. Two of those goons had gotten the drop on him for a minute back there and his body was not interested in putting forth more effort than absolutely necessary.

"I ain't a meteorologist. It was 60% chance nothin' would happen." He grumbled, walking out ahead of her slightly under the pretence of taking point.

Parker rolled her eyes, carefully matching his footprints, "that's still a 40% chance there would be rain. Everyone knows you don't even _think _about jumping off anything bigger than 5 stories unless it's under at least 30%."

Eliot glanced over his shoulder, confused, "we're not jumping off a building, Parker." He tried not to let it come out 'grumpy and growly' but he _definitely _just felt a raindrop. Or two.

"No, we're doing something much more dangerous," she continued, as if she was having to explain a very simple concept to an equally simple student, "we're trudging through the woods. Uphill. In the middle of spring when unexpected rainstorms aren't uncommon and there are men with guns after us." She paused and Eliot waited, knowing there was more, "although admittedly, the 'men with guns' part wasn't planned."

Eliot grunted his agreement.

"Hey, did you try your cell phone?" Parker asked as if the idea had suddenly occurred to her, and started patting herself down looking for hers, then frowned when she remembered shoving it into the outside pocket of her backpack.

"Yeah, about an hour ago. No service."

Parker sighed, "Great. Just great. Now we-"

She was cut off by the deafening sound of raindrops battering against leaves and hard packed dirt around them as the sky suddenly opened up and dropped its load, soaking Parker and Eliot in seconds.

"Eliot." Parker said after a moment.

Eliot looked over at her, though the rain was falling so hard she was obscured even three feet away from him. She didn't look angry. Or even annoyed. She looked blank. It disturbed him just as much now as it did before they were together.

"Yeah?"

"I never want to see nature again. Ever."

Eliot, on the other hand, was annoyed, angry and a host of other emotions he didn't want to analyze long enough to give a name, especially since the majority of them were pointed at himself. He sighed and reached out to grab her hand.

"C'mon, we need to find someplace safe to wait this out."

Parker followed him automatically, muttering all the way, "We're going back to the city when this is over where there are buildings and taxis and stores and civilization and we're never leaving."

---

"I'm cold."

Eliot looked over toward Parker's voice. The only light in the small, shallow cave he'd found came from the opening, where visibility was almost nil because of the sheets of rain. But he could see well enough to make out Parker's curled up form beside him, hugging her legs, clearly shivering. They were both soaked to the bone and the temperature had dropped significantly since the rain started.

He pushed some wet hair out of his face.

"C'mere," he beckoned with a jerk of his chin. Parker needed no further prompting and immediately scrambled over between his legs and to his chest.

Eliot wrapped his arms around her middle and pulled her closer. Hell, he was cold too.

Parker shifted a few times to get comfortable until the heat that radiated off him started to transfer through their damp clothes. Her elbow shifted against him, accidentally pressing into some boot-shaped bruising on his side and Eliot winced. He pressed a kiss to her hair, silently encouraging for her to be still and tightened his hold on her.

"I'm sorry." He said after a few minutes.

She turned her head slightly and raised an eyebrow, "for what?"

He almost laughed at the thought of having to explain himself. Any other girl would be giving him an earful already for ruining her hair and makeup or something. Parker, aside from being cold and hungry, didn't seem to even really care about their current situation.

"For today."

She shrugged, "you can't control bad guys. Or rain," she paused and then, "just remember the 30% Rule for next time, okay?"

Eliot laughed softly and nodded, resting his head on her shoulder. Parker felt his warm breath against her neck and found the temptation too much to bear. Turning her head and shoulders slightly, she was able to capture his lips in a slow, smoldering kiss that immediately made Eliot's mind go blank.

After a few seconds she felt him get tense and pull back.

"What?" she asked, confused. He'd never made her stop kissing him before. She didn't like it. She sat forward, turning her body so she could face him more fully, "what's wrong?"

Eliot leaned his head back against the wall for a moment, taking a few slow, deep breaths with his eyes closed. When he had his control back he opened them and gave her a crooked smirk.

"There are men out there who seem hell bent on killin' us. I need to focus," he leaned forward and gave her a quick kiss that was both promise and apology, "believe it or not, your lips are very distractin' darlin'."

Parker smiled and Eliot's smirk morphed into a smile in return. Her ego sufficiently boosted, he motioned for her to turn back around.

"Now _I'm_ cold."

"I was trying to fix that," Parker grumbled halfheartedly, settling into Eliot's arms once more. She felt his chest vibrate when he chuckled and she leaned her head back against his shoulder.

"Yeah, I see that. But I'm not letting these guys catch me with my pants down."

Parker raised an eyebrow at him.

He caught her stare and grinned, "Literally _or_ figuratively."

She laughed and they lapsed into comfortable silence, at least, as comfortable as it could be with them both keeping vigilant watch for approaching threats.

After about five minutes Parker started to shift and move restlessly again.

"Parker."

"I'm bored," she said frowning.

Eliot sighed and tightened his arms around her again, ignoring the pain that shot down his injured arm, "go to sleep."

She stiffened, "not tired."

Eliot leaned down and kissed the column of her neck, knowing full well that wasn't the reason she was opposed to sleep.

"I'll be right here, baby. I'm not gonna let anything happen to you."

He felt her relax and silently congratulated himself on being so fluent in Parkerese.

Parker sighed, resting her hands over his and she scrunched her eyes shut, as if she thought that would help her sleep better. Eliot smiled.

"Tell me a story." She demanded then, and Eliot tilted his head down at her before returning his gaze to the cave opening.

"About what?" He asked roughly, he was pretty sure any of the stories he could tell would have the exact opposite effect of putting her to sleep.

"I don't know," she shrugged to illustrate the point, "tell me about something that makes you happy. I just like the way your chest feels when you talk. All rumbly."

Eliot smiled again, not entertaining the thought of how long it had been since someone made him smile as often as Parker did, and thought a moment.

"The only two things that make me happy are you and horses, Parker."

Parker opened her eyes. Eliot was still staring out at the rain, or probably, through the rain, she didn't think he even realized what he'd said. And she didn't want to make him (or her) uncomfortable by pointing it out so she closed them again.

"What about cooking?" When he didn't object she continued, "tell me about your favorite meal."

"I like breakfast."

"Mm, me too." Parker sighed, smiling.

Eliot shook his head, chuckling a little bit and it made Parker snuggle in closer to him.

"Cap'n Crunch cereal is not breakfast, Parker. At least, not the kind I'm talkin' about," he began. He wasn't used to being the one to fill the silence, but if talking made her relax and go to sleep, he would do it. No need for both of them to be worrying.

"I'm talkin' about a real, home cooked breakfast. With bacon and sausage and scrambled eggs so fluffy and yellow they're like a picture," he rambled, surprised at how easy it was, "fried in the same pan as the bacon so they got a good flavor, you don't need ketchup or nothin' like that. And Pancakes, fresh pancakes from scratch, not a box, and fresh hash browns from potatoes from your own garden," he paused, to see if Parker was still awake.

"Mm-hm?" She muttered, eyes still closed. She was close.

"And biscuits," he let out a groan of pleasure and a smile tickled Parker's lips.

"I don't know if I should be offended or flattered that you make the same noise thinking about biscuits that you do when my mouth is wrapped around your-"

He cut off her words with a kiss and whispered against them, "what did I tell you about those distractin' lips?"

She giggled lightly and nodded, "please, continue. I believe you were on biscuits."

He leaned back with a grin and sighed, "fresh biscuits. Warm from the oven, steaming hot and flaky. You smother 'em with honey or butter or jam and they're so good you never want to stop eatin' 'em. They warm you up from the inside out and when they settle in your stomach…it's like comin' home."

He trailed off. He knew he was far too relaxed leaning against the wall of the cave with Parker cradled close to his chest, but he couldn't bring himself to go back into his hitter head-space just yet. Because even cold, soaking wet and sitting on a hard dirt floor, he realized he was happier now than he'd ever been.

Parker sighed as she slipped off, murmuring something that sounded suspiciously like 'you owe me breakfast in bed after all of this' and he tightened his arms around her.

"Count on it."

---

_TBC__- Wow, each of the first chapters said 'end' instead of 'tbc' why didn't anybody tell me! lol. I always forget to change those stupid letters.  
_


	4. Only One Way Out

**A/N:** Helllooooo everybody! Here is my next chapter, HUGE thanks as always to my beta _**vickyloka, **_but any remaining mistakes are mine alone. Also, big hugs and Christian Kane smiles to _**suddencarolina, Tabitha of MoonAurora/FireSpirit, lilz54, SeaStarr, luna-pendragon, eligin, lwhilley, vickyloka **_(again! You overachiever, jk, luvya!)_**, **__**Angel JJK**_, _**Mayhem21, Irish63116, redqueen74, Kristin4, cresdin, **_and _**MusicEstVita**_ for reviewing! You spoil me...not that that's a bad thing...in fact, it's a very good thing.._._Enjoy! -pj

**---**

The rain stopped later that evening, but Eliot decided they ought to stay the night in the cave. It was rapidly getting dark and more likely they would get hurt if they couldn't see where they were going. And if the men after them had night vision they'd be at a severe disadvantage.

Parker was not entirely sure his judgment was sound.

"What are we going to _do_ all night?" Parker asked, genuinely confused, then added, "I'm hungry."

Eliot was busy adjusting some of the nearby rocks and branches to conceal their hiding spot better. He paused and reached into the cargo pocket of his pants and tossed something at her.

"Half now, half for breakfast."

Parker caught it and looked down at the shiny wrapper. "An energy bar?" She unwrapped it and started to take a bite, but stopped.

"What are you going to eat?"

He shook his head, face pinched in concentration as he wedged a bushy branch in between two large rocks to finish covering the opening.

"I'll be okay."

She frowned, "you need to eat."

When he didn't respond she stood up, hands on her hips, "it's not fair for me to eat and you not to."

Eliot's shoulders sagged a bit and he paused before continuing in what he was doing, "It's not the first time I've gone hungry, Parker. I'll be fine. I can find us something to eat tomorrow."

She had no doubt that he could, in fact, 'find them something tomorrow' but that wasn't really the point. And as she watched him perfect their camouflaged hiding spot, examining his work with a critical, practiced eye, something clicked into place.

The way he kept constantly scanning the trees for their attackers. The rope. The knives he kept on him and scattered around his apartment. She looked down at the energy bar. He kept food on him. The fact that he knew how to camouflage them for the night. Knew how to find a spot like this in the first place.

Her stomach dropped.

Eliot felt her gaze on him and turned to look at her when he finished moving the branches into place. Parker's eyes were wide, her hands hung limply at her sides and her mouth was parted slightly in distress.

"Parker?" He frowned, taking a slight step forward.

"This isn't the first time you've been hunted like this." It wasn't a question, but the way his entire demeanor changed, resigned and closed off, told her it was true.

She blew out a breath and turned to sit against the wall, balancing the energy bar on her knees.

"Not hungry anymore."

Eliot sighed and moved to sit beside her, close enough that their shoulders were touching. Parker kept staring straight ahead at the wall opposite them. She understood the impulse to keep food on hand. To always be on the lookout for danger. But all those habits seemed to have waned and died out since she started working with the team.

What did it mean that she no longer had them? What did it mean for Eliot that he _did? _

"Hey," he said quietly.

She turned to look at him and the look of loss and sadness on her face formed a tight knot in his stomach. He racked his brain for something to say but came up empty and ended up just staring back at her. Finally, Parker looked away and picked the energy bar up off her knees, unwrapped it halfway and held it out to him.

He started to protest that she needed it more than him, but glanced again at her face and saw the plea and desperation written so plainly there.

Eliot sighed softly, wrapped his hand around hers and brought the bar to his mouth to take a small bite. He was glad he did when Parker's face lit up with a small smile and the tears-that-weren't-quite-there disappeared. He pushed her hand back toward her and raised his eyebrows expectantly.

She obediently took a bite, just as small as his had been, and handed it back allowing Eliot to rewrap the bar and put it in his pocket.

She drew her legs up to her chest and mumbled something he couldn't hear.

"What?" he asked quietly, stretching his legs out to cross them at the ankles.

"I said I think I love you."

Eliot's head snapped over to hers in shock. They'd always carefully avoided using those words between them. Eliot didn't because the only times he'd ever said them was to get a girl in bed and he didn't want to cheapen Parker like that. Parker didn't because, if she was honest with herself, she wasn't entirely certain she knew what they meant.

Eliot reached down between them to take her hand and thread their fingers together.

"You not sure?" He smiled gently. Parker shrugged, pulling his hand into her lap to play with his fingers.

"Not sure I even know what it means. But…when I think about why you are who you are…what you've done, even when you didn't want to," she looked up at him, her eyes wide and bright, "it makes me sad." She took a sharp breath and laid one hand on her chest, "deep."

Eliot blinked, feeling the full force of her words, the new level of concern behind them that startled them both.

He shook his head, reaching out to touch her cheek, "don't worry 'bout me darlin'."

"I don't worry," she said immediately, in a voice that was unexpectedly strong, "I just…wish it could be different."

There was no pity in the words and no judgment. Only regret and sadness.

"Parker, I chose this life. To be who I am."

She nodded and sighed again.

"I know. Me too." She snuggled further into his side and he took the hint, raising his arm to wrap around her and she rested her head on his shoulder, "I think that means there's something wrong with both of us."

Eliot laughed and squeezed her tighter, rubbing up and down on her arm a few times to get her to relax.

She obeyed his unspoken request and closed her eyes, knowing he wouldn't sleep at all that night, but would insist she did.

With another sigh, Parker slowly drifted to sleep.

---

When they woke the next morning it was just before first light and Eliot wasted no time in getting them on the move. They picked their way carefully through the forest in the dim morning light at a pace only slightly slower than the day before, Parker complaining endlessly about being woken before 8am an _unprecedented _two days in a row.

By mid morning they found themselves at the top of the small mountain they'd been climbing in the first place.

"Eliot, relax. We lost 'em." Parker said after his fourth time glancing over their shoulders.

Eliot gave her a look. "And if we didn't?"

She rolled her eyes, tiptoeing forward to see over the nearly 100 foot drop extending below.

"We haven't seen or heard from them in over a day," she commented, leaning out over the edge.

Eliot shifted his gaze to Parker and cursed, quickly closing the distance between them. His hand shot out to grab her arm and pulled her back to his chest, away from danger but only by a few feet.

"Dammit Parker."

She smiled, nonplussed.

"Can you think of a better way to go?" She said, ignoring his concern and continuing the conversation. She gestured with a sweep of her hand at the landscape spread out before them.

The trees gave way about twenty feet back from the summit and with their backs to them standing out at the edge which was almost a cliff, they could see for miles. Low, rolling hills spread out before them, punctuated by sharply inclined taller hills, like the one they were on now. The entire valley was blanketed by green and flowering trees in full bloom. In the distance they could see a lake sitting peacefully nested between two hills and every now and then a cackle of birds would move in mass from one treetop to another.

Eliot sighed, shaking his head.

"Only you can make death sound almost appealing." He said, drawing a hand around her shoulders and she turned to give him a side hug.

"This is what I brought you to see," he whispered, dropping a kiss onto the top of her hair. It was a different side of the mountain than he was used to being on, but the end result was the same, "my favorite place in the world."

She tipped her head up to look at him, surprised.

"What? You thought I was dragging you through the forest at eight o'clock in the morning for no reason?"

She nodded, "yes."

He chuckled, squeezing her against him, "Nah. It's better at sunset thought. Sun sets just behind that lake there. It's like the sky is on fire. Most beautiful thing in the world."

Parker stared up at him until he couldn't stand to ignore it and looked down at her. He saw tears standing in her eyes and frowned, alarmed.

"Parker what-?"

She grabbed both sides of his face and cut him off with a tender but urgent kiss.

"Thank you," she whispered.

Eliot wasn't sure what she was thanking him for or why she looked about ready to cry, but he wasn't able to contemplate it very long either. The moment was broken as gunshots and shouts ripped through the air.

Eliot's reaction was immediate, taking a defensive, fight-ready stance as he placed himself between Parker and the group of men that suddenly emerged from the tree line.

Eliot recognized one of them as a man who had attacked them before and the red stained bandage on his arm confirmed it. He'd been joined by a handful of his buddies now, all carrying similar weapons and forming a half circle around them, cutting off their exits.

He cursed inwardly at himself for allowing his guard to go down. Now they had no weapons, no leverage and nowhere to go.

Parker's eyes grew wide at the site of guns trained on them, steady and precise. She knew Eliot's feelings on guns and why, but these men were smart, staying far enough away not to allow Eliot any advantages.

The one in the middle, with short gray hair and harsh black eyes, motioned toward them and barked something in Russian that she didn't understand. She wasn't overly surprised when Eliot responded in the same language, growling through his teeth.

Parker didn't hesitate.

Being careful to move slow so as not to call attention, she got up on her tip-toes to whisper into Eliot's ear just as he finished speaking.

"Do you know how to fall?"

Before he could process what she was saying, before the antsy bad guys' fingers could get any tighter on their triggers, she reached forward, locked her hands around Eliot's waist and threw all of her weight backward, sending them both back over the edge of the cliff.

---

_END__- Would you look at that...a cliffie! Haha, literally!  
_


	5. Just Keeps Gettin' Better

**A/N:** I agree with **_suddencarolina, Mayhem21, cresdin, Likeka, Chipmunk169646, vickyloka - _**also my lovely beta**_, BookLover223, spnchick, luna-pendragon, georgie's-jail3, redqueen74, SuzSeb, SiriusDoctorWhoHoney329, lilz54, vampout, eligin, SeaStarr, wishyouknew222 _**and**_ Angel JJK_** letting them jump off a cliff was a completely horrible way to end the chapter. Sorry. :) So this chap is where the whump finally hits big time. Oh, and FYI, I want everyone to know that I am TOTALLY fine with long-winded reviews. For some reason people seem to think I would find that annoying. My feeling is, the longer, the better. Next chap will, more than likely, be the last. Enjoy! -pj

**---**

They both tried their best to fall loose and roll with it instead of against it, but Parker still felt the sickening crack when her arm gave way beneath her and Eliot's ankle banged painfully against more than one rock that he narrowly missed with his head.

His ribs met a few though.

They landed in a small, cold stream at the bottom of the cliff. Eliot was pretty sure he didn't lose consciousness, and he waited until the men's shouts from the top of the summit died off to move, hoping they would think he was dead from the fall. At least he knew who sent them now, but he couldn't think of revenge just then.

"Parker, you alright?" He called allowing himself a few moments to stop the world from turning before he pushed up into a sitting position. He groaned and clenched his teeth, various and sundry new injuries making themselves known, along with the gunshot wound that was bleeding gain.

He paused when he realized there was no answer and he didn't hear thrashing in water or groans of pain either.

"Parker?"

He forced his eyes open and his stomach objected vehemently when he whipped his eyes around searching for a blonde head and khaki shorts. Finally saw her, limp and wet a few feet away, mercifully laying face up in the six inch deep stream.

"Parker!" He scrambled over to her, ignoring his body's every protest of pain, and pulled her into his lap, seeing a trail of water diluted blood soaking into the hair on the right side of her head.

Parker had not been so lucky with the rocks.

---

Eliot bit his lip, his brow furrowing as he looked around, a thousand rules and instincts whirling around his head at the same time.

_Feel pain, push it aside. Parker's here, protect her. Out in the open, must find cover. It's cold, ignore it. There are hostiles, take them out._

The world started to tilt slightly and Eliot closed his eyes, forcing a few deep breaths down into his lungs and he reached up to touch a bump throbbing on the side of his head. Maybe he hadn't quite avoided _all _of the rocks.

He opened his eyes again and squinted in an attempt to keep everything straight. First things first. He had to get them out of the water and he had to find cover so he could see more clearly what their injuries were.

He quickly assessed the risk/reward of the few options he could see nearby and decided a cluster of bushes near where the water dropped a few feet in a mini waterfall was the best bet.

Moving to his knees, Eliot ignored the pain of sharp river-rocks digging into his skin and slipped his hands under Parker's limp neck and legs. He shifted to his feet and stood, only to fall painfully back down when his ankle gave out, narrowly missing crushing Parker beneath him as the world darkened around the edges.

Eliot cursed and heaved a breath, which caused agonizing pain to flash across his ribs and he took a moment to collect himself.

_Have to move. Have to get out of the open. Not safe. Hurt. Not safe. _

He shook his head slightly and then bit his lip, realizing the sudden movement was not a good idea. There wasn't much he could do for himself as far as first aid until he got his hands on some ace bandages and someplace soft to lay down and he couldn't help Parker until he calmed down.

Eliot growled at himself, glancing around again out of habit, though he knew there was no way the men had found another way around the mountain yet. He realized his hands were trembling and made fists and pressed them against his eyes. He hadn't been this shook up during a mission since his first week of basic training.

Eliot froze.

No. Not a mission.

A hike.

A hike on a damned well deserved day-off when he was supposed to relax and laugh and _enjoy _himself for God's sake.

But he knew better than to try and believe that's what it was anymore. It may not have started out as a mission, as a job, but that's what it was now. A mission to get them both out alive.

Eliot could still feel his heart racing, his mind fuzzy from panic and distress, so he resorted to an old interrogation evasion technique he hadn't thought of in years. It had become second nature there for a while.

What did it mean that he now had to think about it?

He didn't want to know.

Eliot dipped his chin, his brow furrowed in concentration, and closed his eyes taking slow, deep breaths.

He visualized his heart, allowing the sound of it thudding in his chest to invade his head and made a conscious effort to slow it down, imagining the organ inside his chest and imposing his will upon it as if he physically held it in his hands.

He saw his fear, his panic, his anger and his pain, black and ugly and trying to choke him. He fought them as he would any human opponent that threatened his life and threw them into a locked box. He reached up and put the box on a shelf behind the curtain in his mind where he kept the names of all the people he'd killed and the look Aimee had given him across a room full of friends at her wedding reception.

He saw the adrenalin and determination, friendly faces he could count on, and focused on them, enlarged them and allowed them to flow through his veins until it was all he could feel.

_Stay calm. Complete the objective._

Steeling himself, he shifted his feet beneath him once more, this time more carefully, and pulled Parker into his arms, for once grateful for her slight weight. He kept his breathing even, his heart rate slow as he half limped, half stumbled over to the stand of bushes, dropping down to his knees gracelessly and got Parker into position across his lap.

_Not safe, but safer. Parker's here. Take care of her. _

He licked his lips and did his best to tend to her injuries with what little they had on them. He splinted her arm with strips cut from her hoodie and a relatively straight stick he'd found nearby. He wrapped her head and bound the deeper cuts she'd gotten from the fall, his movements quick and efficient. Practiced.

When Parker finally groaned and her eyes fluttered open Eliot stilled completely, staring at her.

"Parker?" He asked, the sound of his voice almost too loud in the quiet of his mind. He'd not been able to look up as often as he liked while he tended to Parker and his sensitive hearing had automatically made up for his distraction.

Parker snapped back to reality with all the speed and clarity of someone a little too used to coming out of a concussion. For a moment her entire body went stiff and then just as quickly it exploded in white hot pain and she vaulted upright, only to be pushed back down by a pair of strong hands.

"Lay still."

She recognized Eliot's voice, but he didn't look like himself. She titled her head at him and squinted.

"Eliot?"

"Are you alright?" He asked, the voice was all business, holding none of the concern or softness he usually reserved for her.

She frowned fully. This was _way _past grumpy and growly.

"Not my first time falling without a line. I'll live," Parker she said matter-of-factly, "what's wrong with you?"

Eliot gave her an incredulous look and folded his knife, slipping it back into his boot.

"Nothing another fall over a 100 foot cliff couldn't cure." He snapped, whipping his hair out of his face and satisfied when his vision swam less than before. He kept his eyes glued to the tree line, keeping up a steady scan.

Parker's brow knitted and she pushed herself up against a large rock, pulling her injured arm across her body protectively.

"Eliot?"

His eyes snapped over to her quickly then looked away again. His mouth was pursed into a thin line, the planes of his face set in tense, sharp concentration. He was wound tighter than a coiled cobra. He looked ready for a fight. Hell, he looked ready for a war.

"Eliot," she said again, this time almost to herself. He ignored her.

"Eliot look at me right now."

He did, frowning, "can you stand?"

"No," she said immediately, a cold weight settling into her stomach. She didn't recognize those eyes. They were the same open, Oklahoma sky blue that she remembered. There was a coldness there she didn't know. A calculating, dangerous, wild look in them that made her want to shrink away. Briefly, she wondered how many people's last conscious thought had been of these eyes as Eliot robbed them of existence.

She'd seen Eliot fight a half dozen guys with nothing more than strength, speed and a cocky smile. She'd seen him deal out painfully accurate blows that instantly sent someone to their knees, choking for air.

But seeing that look in his eyes was the first time Eliot had ever scared her. So she did the only thing she could ever do when she was scared. She reacted.

Parker's good arm shot out and hooked around to the back of Eliot's neck and pulled him to her, smashing their lips together hard enough to bruise them both. She felt him immediately get tense and his arms flew up to hers and she panicked, knowing what damage he could do when in this state, and pushed her tongue into his mouth greedily. Desperately.

Eliot's eyebrows shot up in surprise as she worked him over, each muscle in his body slowly relaxing to return to the subdued power she'd come to expect from him.

He tilted his jaw away to breathe and rested his forehead against hers, "I told you 'bout those distractin' lips."

Parker didn't smile, but pulled away to level him with an assessing look.

This time when he met her eyes, she saw _him_, saw Eliot. The cold look retreated away from the clear blue irises and the shadows parted like clouds.

"Where did you go?" She whispered.

He looked at the ground, closing his eyes briefly before looking back up at her, "I needed to get the job done," he lifted his hand to her face and brushed his fingers along her cheek, encircling her ear before falling back down to his side, "had to keep you safe. Had to get to a place in my head where I could push everything else aside and do that."

Parker frowned, "well don't do it again. It scares me," she poked him indignantly in the leg, "you're supposed to scare the bad guys, not me."

Eliot nodded seriously and lifted her good hand to his lips, brushing them across the bruised knuckles, "I'm sorry, darlin',' though he couldn't help feeling like it was a lie. He would do whatever it took to keep her safe.

Always. Period.

He forced a small grin and stood, "ready to get going?"

Parker sighed, too tired to voice the string of complaints that popped into mind and let him help her up. She paused at the head rush she got from standing, fighting dizziness and nausea, and they started walking. Eliot limped severely beside her, his ankle protesting on one side and his ribs on the other.

"Eliot," Parker said after they'd been walking for a while in silence. He grunted, too tired to come up with a real response.

"I need to pee."

He glanced over at her, she was wringing her hands and bouncing slightly with each step.

"We're headed toward a ranger's station about three miles from here. Saw it when we were up top. You can go when we get there."

"No. I need to go _now_."

Eliot sighed, he'd suspected as much.

"Alright, well…pick a tree."

Parker nodded and turned to step away a few feet into some nearby bushes. She paused in reaching for her shorts and turned around.

"Turn your back."

"Aw Parker c'mon we need to-"

"I know we do," she snapped irritably, "so just turn around so I can do this."

Eliot sighed, muttering, "Ain't like it's nothin' I haven't seen before," but did as she asked.

Parker nodded her head once, satisfied and then went about her business. As she was pulling her shorts back up she bit her lip, having a hard time with fastening the button as her vision went slightly blurry and doubled. She stumbled back a few steps, disturbing some fallen sticks and leaves and yelped at a sharp pain in her leg.

She looked down, still swaying slightly, but was pretty sure she saw blood on her leg and something moving around down there.

Eliot heard Parker's scream and took off, slipping a knife out of his belt and into his hand in one swift movement. But when he got to Parker she was alone. He saw her puzzled expression and followed her gaze down just in time to see blood soaking into her sock and a snake slithering away into the bushes.

"Shit," he whispered, and grabbed Parker by the arms, swinging her away from the area and down onto the ground against a tree, ignoring her yelp of surprise and groan of sudden nausea.

Parker swallowed hard to keep her breakfast down. She was pretty sure it wouldn't taste good the second time around. She wanted to ask what was going on, but Eilot's movements were quick and precise, his face pinched in an expression she knew to be anxiety masquerading as annoyance.

She bit her lip and watched silently, knowing better than to interrupt him, her worry growing with each calculated movement. Eliot quickly retrieved two semi-straight sticks and broke them in half. She held back a wince as he carefully but quickly drove each stick into a spot just next to her leg, two on each side, completely immobilizing it in it's position straight out in front of her, angled down on the slight incline where she sat.

"Eliot?" she asked quietly.

Eliot grit his teeth and looked up at her. She gasped at the look in his eyes. She'd almost been afraid he was back in that other place, the scary one, again. But he wasn't. She almost preferred that cold look to the one he wore now.

She'd never seen him scared before.

"That was a Copperhead viper," he explained slowly, seeing the recognition in Parker's eyes, he continued, "they're bites usually aren't lethal but…"

"It's venomous." She said, understanding now why Eliot had taken such quick action. The more movement, the quicker the poison would circulate through her body, "okay." She bit her lip and nodded, "you're gonna have to go on without me."

Eliot immediately shook his head, "no. No way."

"Look, you said the ranger station is only like three miles away. I can't walk like this and you know it. You can run that far if it's just you in like twenty minutes, be back here in forty and we all go home."

"Dammit Parker," Eliot hissed, "I'm not leaving you here. You've got a concussion and a poisonous snake bite."

"So you're gonna do what?" she was getting impatient now, every second they spent arguing was a second they lost that their pursuers gained, "you can't carry me all that way and you can't fight those guys if they find us."

Eliot cocked an eyebrow and grunted and Parker shook her head.

"There were six of them, Eliot. And you've got a twisted ankle, broken ribs and a concussion," he gave her an odd look and she shrugged, "your pupils are dilated funny, you probably hit your head when we fell."

The headache Eliot had been trying not to think about flared for a moment before he pushed it back down. He hit the ground with his fist, every bone in his body telling him it is _wrong _to leave her behind.

Parker understood his dilemma. Eliot was so easy to read sometimes.

She reached for him and he responded almost automatically, moving to kiss her quickly. She pushed him back almost immediately.

"You're wasting time."

He nodded. Knew she was right. For once, he was following her logic and it was sound. But…damn it felt wrong.

He sighed and stood, walking away to the bushes where the whole thing had began and took out his knife, cutting down several boughs and bringing them back. He situated them around Parker to conceal her and then started moving the dirt around to cover their movements and her legs.

He grabbed her hand and pushed his cell phone into it. It had no service out but they could use the GPS if nothing else.

"Stay quiet. Stay awake," he said, dropping his head to kiss her one last time, "I'll be right back."

With that, he got up and took off at a run, adrenalin and worry and anger spurring him until his ankles and ribs were nothing but an afterthought and he ran harder.

Parker fought to keep her breathing under control, every call of a bird or movement of an animal set her on edge. She was alone, immobile. Vulnerable.

There was nothing she hated more.

Parker had no idea how much time had passed but eventually she felt eyelids starting to get heavy and her leg was on fire. She thought she heard voices in the distance, but couldn't be sure, and as she finally succumbed to sleep, she couldn't help feeling like she was letting Eliot down.

---

_TBC- So....what didja think.....__  
_


	6. Something Wrong With You

**A/N:** Oh man I love you guys. Seriously!!!! You're TREMENDOUS! _**whimseyrhodes, Kristin4, spnchick, BlueEyes444, SeaStarr, georgie's-jail3, redqueen74, luna-pendragon, simplygloomy, Angel JJK, eligin, Kater85, cresdin, vampout, suddencarolina, lilz54, darkloves, SiriusDoctorWhoHoney329, Mayhem21, leveragefan, vickyloka **_and_** BookLover223 **_all rock so hard I can't even tell you. As far as the fic goes, Eliot did probably get off easy with the whump in this one...that's not like me...gonna have to do something about that in my next one...lol. I wasn't sure this was quite right, thought maybe I needed more action and stuff, but I was tired of the woods and I love writing dialogue and my beta seemed to think it came out well, if the extremely enthusiastic email she sent me is anything to go by. lol. Luvya **_vickyloka_**!! So this is the last chap, Enjoy! -pj

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Parker wrinkled her nose, her eyes still closed in an attempt to hold onto sleep a little while longer. At least this time she wasn't in some dusty air vent or laying face first on some dirty hotel floor.

She really hated that.

With her eyes closed she knew she was at a hospital and she relaxed. She didn't like hospitals, but she didn't hate them either. They fed her and healed her and she was usually able to get some rest. Since she didn't get caught, she didn't typically worry about waking up in handcuffs, but even if she did, it was never a problem for long.

"Ah, I see you're coming back to us."

A kind, but unfamiliar voice, spoke somewhere above her and she forced her eyes to crack open, squinting against the dim light.

"Hello there, Ms. Row. We were wondering when you'd wake up," a round-faced woman smiled and gestured to the other side of the bed, "your husband hasn't left your side for nearly three days."

Parker frowned and glanced over to where she pointed and saw Eliot slumped over in a large stuffed chair that was pulled up next to the bed. She wasn't sure what to be confused about first.

Eliot sleeping with other people in the room, the thought that she'd been unconscious for at least three days or that the woman had just referred to the hitter as her 'husband'. Oh, and there was the whole 'bad men with guns and morning hike from hell' thing that hadn't quite been accounted for.

"W'happn'd?" She mumbled, wincing deeply at the pain of her throat. An ice chip was slipped helpfully between her chapped lips and she closed her eyes momentarily in relief.

"Apparently your weekend hike didn't go quite as planned," the nurse explained gently. Parker bit back a sarcastic 'obviously' and tried not to roll her eyes. "There were some men hunting bear illegally in the woods, they mistook you for prey." She clucked her tongue sympathetically, "your husband was shot and in your haste to get away you stumbled over a cliff. Then you were bit by a snake, we only _just _got you the antivenin in time. It's a miracle you survived, poor dears."

Parker frowned, but didn't ask what 'deer' had to do with anything.

"Is he okay?" She looked over again at Eliot, wondering why he wasn't in his own hospital bed.

"The doctor didn't want him to check out, but he insisted after only 24hours," her eyes widened slightly when she mistook Parker's expression, "he didn't leave you here alone, dear, don't worry. Your sister and father and brother-in-law are all here, you were out for nearly a week you know," the nurse chastised lightly, as if Parker had some control in the matter.

"They'll be in as soon as visiting hours begin, I'm sure," she patted her hand and Parker tried not to pull away.

"How much longer do I have to stay here?"

"Until you're better," a gruff voice answered, and both women looked over to see Eliot staring at them, stretching and cracking his neck.

"I'll give you two a moment alone," the nurse patted Parker's hand once more and the thief gave her an odd look all the way out of the room.

"She's weird-"

She was cut off by Eliot's lips on hers and he ignored his stiff muscles and various aches as he propped himself up on either side of her for a moment, relishing in being close.

"I'm glad you're awake."

He smiled slightly and sat back down, moving slow and deliberate.

Parker nodded, eyeing him closely, "you should check yourself back in."

Eliot just shook his head once, taking one of her hands in his to rub a thumb over her knuckles.

"Y'scared me." He admitted quietly, not looking at her.

Parker's eyes widened, unsure of how to respond to that. As far as she knew, Eliot didn't get scared.

"You scared me first, remember?" She said after a moment, and even to her it sounded childish. But Eliot just nodded, keeping his eyes on the floor.

"Sorry."

Parker shrugged as much as she could, glancing down at the cast on her arm. Black. She nodded approvingly, practical for sliding in and out of shadows.

"How much longer until I can leave?" She asked again, shifting in the bed.

"Few more days," he assured her, frowning down at his boots.

Parker stared at him for a long moment. He wasn't being grumpy and growly, not exactly. But there was something.

"Are you mad?"

Eliot sighed, "you're in a hospital after a six day coma, Parker."

She wrinkled her nose, "that's not what I asked."

He shifted and pushed his hair out of his face, "Not mad."

"Well _something's_ wrong," his lack of response confirmed it. She bit her lip.

"It's not that I threw us over that cliff, because you're not surprised I did that."

He grunted. She was right, he wasn't. In fact, he couldn't say for sure he wouldn't have done the same thing, had he been alone and had a few seconds to think.

"Is it that you didn't get to kill the men that were after us?"

He shifted in the chair and she slid her eyes over to him but didn't move her head.

"Or did you?"

Eliot gave her a serious look, unashamed of the lengths he was willing to go to keep any one of the team safe, including and especially, her.

"You were out for almost a week," he drawled. The rest of the explanation wasn't needed. Six days was more than enough time for Eliot to track down the men who'd ruined their hike and make them pay in whatever way he felt appropriate.

To say she was upset he did it would have been a superfluous lie. "Well, what then?

He looked away and she titled her head toward him as much as she could, propped up in the bed as she was. She squinted at him when he finally looked up at her, his eyes much bluer and brighter than she could remember noticing before.

"Don't ever tell me to leave you again." He said, his voice quiet and rough. Parker set her head back against the pillow, surprised that _that _was what had him most upset.

"It's hard enough, doing what we do and being who we are, to go against instinct and stick around," he continued, quietly. Parker kept her eyes on him, not mistaking his soft-spoken words for unimportant.

"With the team. With you. Everything in me is tellin' me that I should go, for your own good. To keep you safe," he took a deep breath and she could see how much it was costing him to say all of this out loud, "and I'm terrified I'm gonna screw this up and drive you away…but I'm doing my damnedest not to and so don't _tell me_ to go. To leave you."

She watched him fight tears and it was the first battle she'd ever seen him lose. Then she realized she was losing too and swiped the hand with no IVs across her eyes.

"I'm sorry." She whispered, "I won't do it again."

Eliot nodded and stood, coming in to lean close to her, pressing his lips soft and warm against hers. She responded in kind and moved her hand up to cup his neck, keeping him close until he shifted in discomfort and stood up, pressing a hand to his ribs.

She got a mischievous grin on her face and he gave her a wary look.

"What?"

"Married huh?"

To his credit, Eliot didn't flinch, but had the grace to look a bit embarrassed.

"They wouldn't let me stay with you otherwise."

Parker nodded, settling further into the mattress and letting her eyes shut. She heard his clothes rustle slightly as he shifted on his feet in an uncharacteristic display of anxiety.

She opened her eyes, "what?"

Eliot shrugged, his eyes flicking away from her and then back again, "no reaction? I start telling people we're married and you have nothing to say?"

She shrugged, "nope." Eliot kept staring at her and she sighed, "it's not an altogether unpleasant thought. Being married to you, Sparky."

Slowly, a grin spread across Eliot's face. He reached out to gently brush his knuckles across her cheek and tucked a loose lock of hair behind her ear.

"There's something wrong with you," he whispered fondly.

Parker smiled, nodding, "yeah, but there's something wrong with you too."

"Oh, yeah? Why's that?"

She caught his hand and brushed her lips across his knuckles, still scraped up and bruised and probably in the early stages of arthritis.

"Because you like me this way," she smiled wide and Eliot smirked, leaning over to kiss her again.

"Got that right."

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_END- Well that was the end. Thanks again to all the readers, reviewers, lurkers and alerters out there. I love you all. I really loved writing this and reading how much you all loved reading it, and now I can focus on the other umpteen fics I have in the works...lol. Till next time everyone! :-)__  
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